Some bullying bosses are overt. They yell, micromanage, criticize relentlessly, make personal remarks, are never satisfied and never promote staff.
Other bullies are more covert.

For example, Abby controls her team by making quick decisions and immediately shifting into action. If you stop to deliberate, she’ll become exasperated and question your intelligence. Because she’s in a hurry, few people get consulted in advance and things are always done her way. Once she’s made up her mind, she won’t change direction.

On the other hand, Alex moves with great deliberation and caution. He’s just as controlling as Abby, but in the opposite way. He wants to chew and digest all the details before he’ll decide. If you want to move rapidly, he’ll become exasperated and question your intelligence and good judgment. Because he controls the snail’s pace, few people even bother making input anymore.

If he doesn’t want to implement a plan, he’ll say he needs endless information and reflection. Usually, his deliberations push so hard against deadlines that everyone has to work hectically at the last minute, including weekends. He doesn’t mind because he’s still in control.

Alex tries to control his managerial peers by delaying decisions. His arguments defending deliberation and caution can be very persuasive. No one wants to be labeled “thoughtless or careless.”

People who are concerned with making good decisions will adjust their processes and timing to fit the situation. Some decisions can be made with extensive input and deliberation, while others demand unilateral and rapid action. Each style can be successful or have disastrous consequences, depending on the situation.

The rapid responses of many small businesses secured them productive niches while corporate goliaths deliberated. Similarly, decisions made in the blink of an eye – based on accurate intuition, the hair standing up on the back of your neck or a wrenching in your gut – can save your life or business. If you wait for proof, it will be too late.

But, of course, we don’t want someone building a bridge or an airplane based on snap decisions.

Be warned: Abby and Alex’s covert, controlling techniques are used just as much between couples in personal life and in family businesses. However, the same mindset and methods that work to manage peers in corporate life can be effective in those more personal situations.

How you cope with bullies using these styles depends on whether you’re a peer, a supervisee or a supervisor – see complete article for details.

In a series of articles in the New York Times, “Poisoned Web,” Jan Hoffman details a sexting case gone viral in Lacey, Washington. What can you do for your son or daughter so they don’t get sucked into the black hole of a sexting catastrophe that could ruin their whole lives?

In this particular case, a middle-school girl sent a full-frontal nude photo of herself, including her face, to her new middle-school boyfriend. He forwarded the picture to a second middle-school girl he thought was a friend of the first one. The second girl, an ex-friend with a grudge, forwarded the picture to the long list of contacts on her phone with the caption, “Ho Alert! If you think this girl is a whore, then text this to all your friends.” The photo rapidly went viral.A lot of the analysis about the situation is nothing new:

Why do girls send nude photos of themselves to boyfriends they have or hope to have? The same reasons girls always have.

Why do guys prize and show these pictures as evidence of what studs they are? The same reasons guys always have.

Who or what is to blame? The same culprits get vilified: thoughtless, foolish boys and girls, teenagers, school officials, society, double-standards and technology.

Does technology make sexting worse? Yes, of course. Technology makes it seductively easy to forward pictures and comments. Also, technology makes the information global and permanent. Kids can’t move to another school or even another city in order to get away from the consequences of what they and others did.

In the past, many reputations and lives were ruined by foolish moments. Kids and adults have always been able to exercise righteous or mean or vicious inclinations, but it’s so much easier now.

The boy, the second girl and everyone else who forwards the picture have to face their own stupidity or meanness. And they may have to face their role in a suicide. An act of a moment can destroy a life. Also, they may have to face prison. We hope this will help them do better the rest of their lives. Humans have always learned some lessons the hard way.

Do today’s kids face overwhelming pressure? Many people make excuses for the foolish or nasty kids; as if the external pressures are overwhelming. For example, the article quotes, “'You can’t expect teenagers not to do something they see happening all around them,’ said Susannah Stern, an associate professor at the University of San Diego who writes about adolescence and technology.” This line of thought focuses on reducing all pressure and temptation.

But pressure was just as great throughout history as it is now – depending on the particular time in each society.

I would require all schools have assemblies and programs in which students and parents are required to participate. Law enforcement must be involved to present examples of what can happen to the kids who send pictures of themselves and to the ones who forward those pictures. This will increase awareness of the dangers of kids succumbing to pressure to do something foolish like sending pictures of themselves and of the penalties for kids who forward pornography.

Parents have the major responsibility to preach, teach and police their children’s use of internet and wireless devices. This is our ounce of prevention. As the father of the girl who sent her nude picture said, “I could say it was everyone else’s fault, but I had a piece of it, too. I learned a big lesson about my lack of involvement in her use of the phone and texting. I trusted her too much.”

These steps will decrease the number of kids involved in sexting. But we’ll never stop 100 percent of kids’ foolish or mean or vicious actions. But that can’t be our intention. Our goal is to educate kids whose awareness of the potential consequences of their actions will awaken in them the ability to do better.

Our goal can’t be to educate or convert psychopaths or people who want to make a living off child pornography. Educational approaches aren’t effective with these people.

Remember, all tactics depend on the situation – the people and the circumstances. So we must design plans that are appropriate to preventing our individual children from sending pictures or forwarding them, and to minimizing the disaster if they act foolishly.